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Brief History of a Family

2024

Zu Feng, Ke-Yu Guo, Xilun Sun, Muran Lin

Drama In post one-child policy China, a middle-class family takes in their only son's mysterious new friend. This triggers buried family tensions as secrets and feelings surface, testing the bonds and expectations holding the family together.

	Media	Author	Review
		John Berra Screendaily	"Zhang Jiahao’s glacial cinematography maintains a coolly observational distance from the characters while toying with identities and perspective through clever use of mirrors."
		Carlos Aguilar Variety	"Jianjie Lin’s sleek and stimulating feature debut"
		Jose Solís The Film Stage	"I left 'Brief History of a Family' with the same sense of wonder and melancholy that comes upon realizing how small we can be."
		James Mottram South China Morning Post	"There are moments of real subtlety sewn into the fabric. The performances are rightly understated too, with Lin also smartly capturing the glistening urban backdrops (...) Rating: ★★★½ (out of 5)"
		Therese Lacson Collider	"The ultimate ambiguity might be enough for some to praise Lin's work, but there's simply not enough to chew on by the end of the story for it to be a resounding success"
		Elena Lazic Cineuropa	"An assured debut displaying a fantastic control of craft and a remarkably nuanced understanding of human psychology"
		Jacob Oller Paste Magazine	"Crafted with such delightful suspense that you can’t help but smile as you squirm, 'Brief History of a Family' pulls from plenty of genre influences to construct a tight dramatic metaphor"
		Chuck Bowen Slant	"A squirm-inducing portrait of family tensions (...) Rating: ★★★ (out of 4)"
		Sheri Linden The Hollywood Reporter	"With its intriguing performances, narrative restraint and unanswered questions, the movie delivers a strong pull of yearning as well as tantalizing currents of suspicion and dread"
		Marya E. Gates rogerebert.com	"Lin's film asks what happens to an individual in a social system that does not allow for that kind of individuality to thrive?"

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